Follow KPCC

Doctor testifies in Oakland transit shooting trial

by Greg Risling | AP

Share

File photo: Wanda Johnson (C), the mother of victim Oscar Grant, leaves a pretrial hearing for Johannes Mehserle, the former Bay Area Rapid Transit officer charged with murder in the shooting death of Grant in Oakland, California last year, at the Criminal Courts Building in Los Angeles on March 26, 2010. Mark Ralston/AFP/Getty Images

A doctor has recounted how he and others tried to save an unarmed black man who was shot by a Bay Area Rapid Transit police officer last year on a Oakland rail platform.

Dr. Alden Harken, chief of surgery at Alameda County Medical Center, testified Monday in Los Angeles that Oscar Grant suffered massive internal bleeding that led to his death.

Grant was shot in 2009 by then-officer Johannes Mehserle, who has pleaded not guilty to murder. The defendant, who is white, was among police called when Grant became involved in an altercation.

Harken says Grant's right lung had to be removed and the bullet also was taken out by surgeons.

The trial was moved from Alameda County because of violence sparked by racial tensions and intense media coverage.